


Silver as the Scar on Your Skin

by cytryne



Series: Rainbow Scars [1]
Category: RWBY
Genre: ?? - Freeform, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, F/F, Gen, I don't even know what tags to use for this kind of relationship, Pre-Relationship, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Volume 3 (RWBY), because i wanted it realised at the worst moment possible, finding out you're soulmates the worst way possible, yes i did make up a soulmate au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-23 09:48:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30053619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cytryne/pseuds/cytryne
Summary: The only definite way to find your soulmate is through injuring each other. Normally it's something small, like a bruise or bump that fades into a brightly colored mark in the shape of the original injury. Normally it's with someone you work well with, someone who completes you.Normally.Sometimes, it ends up a lot worse.The attack on Beacon brings with it one more major change for Ruby.
Relationships: Cinder Fall & Ruby Rose, Cinder Fall/Ruby Rose, Qrow Branwen & Ruby Rose
Series: Rainbow Scars [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2210913
Comments: 12
Kudos: 48





	Silver as the Scar on Your Skin

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't been able to write for a while so, let's hope this went well.

_"Besides, our enemy's trail leads all the way to Haven. That'd be quite the journey for a pipsqueak like you. Catch ya later, kiddo."_

Ruby stared as her uncle turned away and started to leave, utter confusion overwhelming her at everything he'd just said. Power? From her _eyes_? She'd _frozen_ a Grimm? That didn't make any sense, that sort of thing belonged more to fairytales than real life. How was that supposed to be real? She might have been invited to Beacon earlier, but she wasn't _special_ or anything.

Her eyes fell on the mirror over the wall, and she frowned. That wasn't right. They'd never covered mirrors before. There was no reason to, it just defeated the purpose of having a mirror. And, now that she was thinking about it, it wasn't the only thing that seemed off. She hadn't thought of it during that emotional mess of a conversation they'd just had, but . . . her dad hadn't made eye contact once. He'd been uncomfortable telling her about Beacon, and what she'd supposedly done, but he still should have looked at her face. He'd always been so confident, never the kind of person to avoid eye contact. _Especially_ not during such an important conversation.

"Uncle Qrow?"

He paused in the doorway, half turning back to her. "Yeah?"

"Why is the mirror covered?"

Uncle Qrow visibly froze, eyes flicking up and down her before he seemed to come to a decision. "That's not a—"

"—And why wouldn't dad look at me?"

He exhaled at the question, looking pained, and turned around fully to come back in. Gently closing the door behind him, he walked over to her bed. Ruby pulled her legs up to her chest to make room for him to sit, leaning back onto her left and wrapping her right arm around them as she did.

Uncle Qrow smiled awkwardly at her, the smile slipping away as soon as he started talking. "I was hoping to give you some more time to.... process the other news before you had to face this, but sure. I guess I'm doing this right now."

"Ruby...." he started then stopped, reaching into his coat to grab his flask and take a sip. She clutched at her leg with her right hand as he did so, getting increasingly nervous as the silence stretched on. Uncle Qrow didn't tend to hesitate before things unless they were really _really_ bad. That's just not who he was.

"Do you remember anything else from that night? Maybe from after the white light?"

She frowned, thinking back. Then, slowly, she shook her head no. "Just...just the light."

Uncle Qrow smiled again at that, but wasn't a good smile. More pained than anything. "Well, I guess that's a positive, at least. You don't have to live with that memory too."

She opened her mouth to respond and he cut her off, shaking his head. "There was something else happening on that tower. Besides your eyes and the Maiden," he added quickly, correctly predicting her next comment. "It's—well, it'll be easier to show you."

Slowly, he reached over and pulled up her left arm, the one she'd been leaning on. Ruby let him, somehow more confused than before.

And then her arm entered her eyesight, and she froze. Eyes wide, she swallowed hard, her heart dropping down to her stomach as she shook her head. Slowly at first, but gaining speed as she refused to accept what her eyes were telling her.

Her arm was pure silver. _Pure silver_.

She could still feel it, feel her uncle’s loose grip, even move and clench her fist, but didn’t look like skin anymore. It never would.

“That’s _not_ —“ she denied, voice cracking. “That’s not—it _can’t_ be—I—“

“I’m sorry,” Uncle Qrow said hollowly, letting her arm rest on the bed between them.

“That’s not—it _can’t_ be. It’s a side effect of my eyes, or something, it’s not even the right color. It has to be.” She begged him, staring down at her arm. “ _Please_.”

“There’s no side effects of your eyes known to do this,” he denied, and she shook her head again, sniffling. “We think your eyes changed the color to match your eye color instead of your Aura. Summer's did. I’m sorry, Ruby.”

“But the pain—I’ve heard it’s the worst thing in the world, I should’ve felt it.” She tried, knowing before the words even came out of her mouth that they weren’t true.

Uncle Qrow shook his head again. “I’ve known many huntsmen and huntresses who discovered they were soulmates when they accidentally hurt each other sparring. The marks always look like that. _Always_. I’m sorry, Ruby.”

“But she killed Pyrrha.” Ruby said numbly, the concept horrifying her beyond belief. Cinder destroyed Beacon. She couldn’t be her soulmate, she just _couldn’t_. She was her enemy.

“I know. We all hope that we’ll find our soulmate through a silly accident, be able to bear a slight scar with pride, but, well, fate’s not always that kind. You wouldn’t be the first to have an enemy for a soulmate, and you won’t be the last. It’s not always the positive, romantic thing shown in shows.”

Ruby stared down at her hand, blinking back tears. She had a soulmate. She’d always wanted to find her soulmate. The thought of having to either get injured or go through excruciating pain in order to had scared her, but everyone knew that things looked up from that point on. Soulmates made everything better and brighter. To have your other half with you, supporting you, it was the dream. You were supposed to mesh well with each other.

It wasn’t supposed to be with your enemy. You weren’t supposed to find your soulmate because they killed your friend and destroyed your school and you managed to do something mythical and nearly unheard of in response. You weren’t supposed to find out after the fact because you weren’t even conscious for it. You weren’t supposed to find out by hurting them so badly that the mark ended up this big.

Sniffling again, she looked up at her Uncle. “How . . . how big is it? Is it just my arm, or. . . .” How much did I hurt her, she wanted to say but couldn’t bring herself to actually ask.

He looked at her for a long second, then sighed, getting up from the bed. “It’s . . . a little bit more than that, Ruby.”

Uncle Qrow walked over to the mirror and pulled the sheet they’d thrown over it off, letting it fall to the floor, and Ruby _stared_. Her left hand came up slowly to trace the outline of a massive silver mark, wrapping from the left side of her jaw up, across her nose in two portions, and over her eyebrow on that side. She hadn’t thought silver could show up so starkly on her skin before, but this . . . you couldn’t ignore it. Everyone who ever looked at her again would know she’d hurt her soulmate like this.

Everyone would know no matter how she tried to hide it.

Her eyes burned at the thought, and she wrapped her arms around herself as she finally began crying in earnest, sobs shaking her form.

She’d hurt her soulmate.

Her soulmate was evil.

Ruby had _hurt_ her.

Her soulmate had hurt her, and she hated her more than she’d ever hated anyone in her life, but that wasn’t what anyone would notice. They’d look at her and assume she was a terrible person for something she hadn’t even known she’d done, and she wouldn’t be able to explain.

Her friends would know her soulmate was the person who killed Pyrrha. And if her soulmate was that terrible, and they were supposed to be each other’s other halves, wouldn’t that mean she was going to be that terrible of a person too?

The bed creaked and dipped next to her, an arm wrapping around her shoulders, and Ruby leaned into her Uncle. Her tears soaked into his shirt as she sobbed.

How was she supposed to move on from this?

**Author's Note:**

> So, the soulmate dynamics here might be a little confusing because I couldn't work out one that fit the right kind of angst I wanted so I made it up. 
> 
> Basic idea: You find your soulmate through either them accidentally hurting you, or you them. You both get a mark in the color of that person's aura in the shape of the resulting injury, and it puts the person who caused the injury in a few seconds to a minute of excruciating pain, depending on the size of the injury. From that point on, if they deliberately physically hurt each other the same pain and aura-colored marking thing happens. One soulmate dying affects the other/s in some way, but the details vary wildly depending on their personality, abilities, etc. 
> 
> Obviously, huntsmen tend to find their soulmates more often than non-huntsmen, but anyone can. Kids in fighting schools tend to actually be slightly sloppy in an attempt to meet their soulmates, but eventually they work out that it's not a great idea.
> 
> Thoughts?
> 
> Not going to make any comments about if I'll continue this, because once I say something I tend to end up stuck, but I /do/ have ideas for more if I can find the time to write.
> 
> Also, if you follow my Tolkien stuff, I've finally managed to start writing the next part to Dynamics of Control so hopefully that'll go up once midterms are over.


End file.
